Carbery were the winners of the Green Food & Beverage Award at the prestigious 2016 Green Awards, which took place in Dublin last week.
CARBERY were the winners of the Green Food & Beverage Award at the prestigious 2016 Green Awards, which took place in Dublin last week.
The West Cork-based dairy group was also nominated as a finalist for the Overall Green Business of the Year Award. The Green Awards, now in their eighth year, celebrate the commitment that Irish businesses make towards sustainability in Ireland, and the leaders of Ireland’s green industry were recognised and celebrated in front of an audience of close to 450 industry professionals at the gala event.
Carbery faced stiff competition from other industry sustainability leaders to secure the Green Food & Beverage Award. Judges attributed the award to a number of contributory factors, including their involvement in the Origin Green programme, An Bord Bia’s nationally-accredited sustainability programme – of which Carbery is an approved member.
Under Origin Green initiatives, Carbery has targets to reduce energy, waste and carbon emissions, while also focusing on reducing its water consumption rates at the Ballineen facility. Carbery has exceeded the vast majority of these goals ahead of target.
Carbery is also engaged with Sustainable Dairy Assurance Scheme (SDAS) at farm level and runs the Carbery Greener Dairy Farms (CGDF) project, which is Ireland’s first model for best practice in sustainable dairy farming. This innovative, dairy efficiency programme was designed in collaboration with Teagasc to measure, monitor and optimise resource allocation and best sustainable practices on farms.
The judges were also impressed with the recently executed Carbery trees project, where Carbery in partnership with SWS Forestry provided over 26,000 trees for planting throughout its 1,300-farmer supplier base.
Dan MacSweeney, CEO of Carbery, commenting on the win at the Green Awards, stated: ‘We were delighted to win the Green Food & Beverage award at last week’s Green Awards.
‘We pride ourselves on high-quality, sustainably-produced food and dairy ingredients, keeping in line with best practice to improve competitiveness and minimise environmental impact. We look forward to continuing to generate and implement new sustainability initiatives at Carbery over the coming years.’
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